Not drinking the tea

Ms. Lineberger and Ms. Kenny of the tea party lament “Laws in opposition to the will of the American people...intrusions on our Liberty.” Personally, I feel quite free and secure, thanks to government regulations that curtail greedy and unscrupulous individuals who for 30 pieces of silver would endanger my health, financial security, and pursuit of happiness.

Do not be deceived. If the tea party gets its way, families would have to mortgage their homes to pay for their mother’s end of life care, higher education would be a luxury reserved for the rich, rotten meat would be shipped to states without a national agency to inspect it, and fathers would be competing with their adolescent children for sub-minimum wage jobs. No more social security, medicare, medicaid, SCHIP, overtime and other labor protections, disaster aid, civil rights laws, etc.

They say, such things should be under state jurisdiction. Just think what would happen with food safety. A cow raised in Texas, slaughtered in Oklahoma, and sold as steaks in New York. Each state would have their own system of laws, tripling the regulatory compliance costs for the meat producers. Each state would have to have a Customs check at their border to check with their state’s compliance. Such 11th Amendment advocates reveal the absurdity of their thinking in this one example alone.